Post by Dave on Oct 21, 2018 14:41:23 GMT
The Isaac Merritt Singer Tomb 21st October 2018
I was unsure what title to give this thread, so I decided in the end to just simply call it The Isaac Merritt Singer Tomb. When we think about Oldway Mansions we instantly think of Isaac Singer of the Singer's Sewing Machine fame.
Until today I did not even know this great man was buried in the Hele Cemetery in Torquay, after all Isaac was an American gentleman and not really from these parts. I went on line to learn more about the man who gave us Oldway and once again I found so many different stories and had to try and see which articles told nearly the same story.
What I do know is Isaac Merritt Singer (October 27, 1811 – July 23, 1875) was an American inventor, actor, and businessman and one of six children born to Adam Singer (1772–1855) and his wife Ruth, née Benson. His parents divorced in 1821, and Isaac ran away from home a year later, at the age of 12 to join a travelling stage act.
Though he did not invent the sewing machine as many people think, he did design the first practical and efficient one, used mass-production techniques to manufacture it and pioneered the hire-purchase system of buying on credit in easy instalments, which revolutionised consumer behaviour. A sewing machine that operated at 900 stitches per minute.
When he was 19 years old, he married Catharine Maria Haley, who was only 15 years old at the time. In 1835, he moved with Catharine and their son William to New York City, working in a press shop. In 1836, he left the city as an agent for a company of theatrical players, touring through Baltimore, Maryland, where he met then 18 year old Mary Ann Sponsler, to whom he proposed marriage. He returned to New York, where he and Catharine had a second child, a daughter Lillian, born in 1837.
Pregnant, Sponsler arrived in New York and found that Singer was already married. Singer quietly left New York and returned with Sponsler to Baltimore, presenting themselves as a married couple. Their son, Isaac, was also born in 1837.
In 1862, Mary Ann discovered details of his relationship with Mary McGonigal and had her husband arrested for bigamy. Isaac Singer was let out on bond and fled to London. The following year Isaac Singer married Isabella Eugenie Boyer, a Frenchwoman he had met in Paris. They had six children;
The great wealth that Isaac Singer achieved enabled him to buy expensive houses. That had included a mansion on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. In 1871, Isaac Singer purchased an estate in Paignton. He commissioned George Soudon Bridgman to build Oldway Mansion as his private residence and sourced the finest materials from around the world and instructed Bridgman to design the interior in exuberant French style.
Isaac Merritt Singer died on 23 July 1875, shortly before work on the mansion was completed he listed 22 children in his will, but family records show that two more children who were not listed died when they were very young. Paris Eugene Singer, Isaac Singer's third son, supervised the alterations at Oldway Mansion between 1904 and 1907.The rebuilding work was modelled on the Palace of Versailles and the eastern elevation of the building was inspired by the Place de la Concorde in Paris
There so much more history on line about Isaac Merritt Singer and it does make interesting reading and one thing is very clear he was a ladies man. I left home in search of his tomb as I had read it is very impressive.
The tomb was very easy to find and stands out from all the other graves nearby. I was surprised to see so many other names of the Singer family listed on the tomb, are they all in there as well?
There was something special standing next to the tomb of this great man, I am not sure why, maybe it has a lot to do with my love of Oldway. I wonder if he was alive to day, just what he would think about Torbay Council letting Oldway fall into such a poor state.
I had never been in this cemetery before and was really surprised just how big it is, there are some wonderful trees all around the site, but there were some things that made me feel rather sad.
One area that must be the oldest part of the site is full of old graves with headstones either laid down by the council for health and safety reasons, or have been vandalised by mindless idiots. I would expect with graves that old, there maybe no longer any family members who remember then and visit them.
It is so very important that Oldway gets fully restored and open once again for us all to enjoy. I for one will be more than happy to put some money into the appeals once they are set up. I want to be able to step inside and see that wonderful stairway again before its my time to leave this earth.
What Isaac Never Saw Completed and what we must save in his memory
